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by RoseofEden



Category: Red vs Blue
Genre: Blue Team Bonding, F/M, Fluff, Minor Angst, references of character deaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-12 14:02:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19133509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseofEden/pseuds/RoseofEden
Summary: Wash talking about how much he loves Carolina for an entire chapter.





	Home

**Author's Note:**

> Wash talking about how much he loves Carolina for an entire chapter.

If there was one thing Wash knew to be beautiful, it was Carolina’s smile, though few and far between they were. Perhaps the beauty was found within their rarity, perhaps despite it.

What he did know was how radiant that slight curl of her lip was. How warm and affectionate it felt when directed towards him.

 

_He would do anything for that smile._

This he knew more intimately than life.

 

He can feel her heartbeat as if it were his own. She’s close, close enough to twine his hands through tangled locks of crimson hair, close enough to press his nose against her temple and take in the scent so _Carolina_.

Her hands are tangled in his own mess of hair, fingers delicately tracing the Epsilon sized scars on his nape. She rises and falls with his breath, and he’s careful not to stir her, to make too sharp a move and lose _this_ , the peaceful quiet of early morning.

But she’s the first to rise. The sunlight that’s trailing through the window has shifted, time has passed by, and the day has started long before she pulls away from him.

For one brilliant moment her face is framed in a halo of blazing light, sun turning crimson strands to gold. And her eyes, those chartreuse eyes that hold hell’s fury and heaven’s mercy are trained on him. He dares to reach out, to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear, and trace the curve of her jaw with his thumb.

He had always found her beautiful, but back then it was an awe similar to that of a storm. Her essence was a hurricane, a force of nature so truly _a_ _wful_ down the very root of the word,

 

and he? _A fool who adored it._

 

An adoration that must be held from afar, to see but not to touch, and that had been enough.

But now, it is in the eye of the hurricane he finds his solace. He dares to hold her, to feel her warmth in his arms. There is no space between them now, no formalities or rankings,

 

_just two broken souls finding refuge in one another._

 

“We should probably get out of bed, Caboose is usually up by now.” She murmurs, eyes trailing to the door. “He’ll want breakfast.” Wash adds, a smile creeping on his lips. She’s grown so fond of the sim troopers. She’s grown _so much._

 This Carolina is so different to the old Carolina, the Squad Leader who cared so deeply and showed it so little. This Carolina loves openly, though still guarded she may be. She embraces, and laughs, and smiles that brilliant smile.

There’s no formality to the way she sprawls over the sofa as Wash heads to kitchen. He can hear the too-loud voice of Caboose through the wall. “Good morning, Carolina!” He calls, and Wash can practically see the grin that crosses Carolina’s lips when she replies with a soft “Good morning.”

“How did you sleep?” Caboose’s thundering voice, so unaware of its surroundings yet so aware of the hearts within them, shouts.

 

 “Well.”

 

And it’s not the word itself, but the weight behind it that stirs Washington’s heart.

They both didn’t have a great relationship with sleep, the weightless rest that was so fundamental to functioning.

_With sleep comes dreams,_

_and with dreams comes **nightmares.**_

The amount of times he sat on the edge of her cot with her choking down sobs and desperately trying to convince him she was fine? Endless.

The nights spent talking wordlessly to starry skies with heavy eyelids that threatened to close and bring about the ghosts they tried so hard to bury?

Insurmountable.

Wash could wake up and exhale with relief knowing the ghosts that plagued him weren’t his own.

They were the memories of a man he didn’t know by name, a man who died far before a final goodbye and a bullet ended his life.

But Carolina?

The ghosts that chased her were those closest to her. It was the blurry figure of a woman named Allison, and sometimes it was “mother”,

_but it always led to **Tex.**_

The dark shadow sham that imitated her mother’s memory, the warped and twisted adaption her father remembered to be true.

Her father, or the Director, it was never interchangeable as Epsilon and Church had been. Her father’s strong hands that held her, kind and patient voice explaining his plans and dreams,

it couldn’t be compared to the dead tone the Director held when he spoke her name. Not her name, the one he argued so tentatively about with Allison, but the one he assigned her at the beginning of a war of his own creation.

A war that led her to fly and then crash and burn alongside the Mother of Invention, an Icarus in her own accord. A war that took too many good people from her.

York was such a person, one Carolina’s conscious wouldn’t let her free. She had kept his memory trapped inside a cage deep within her chest, and within a rusted zippo lighter.

Carolina’s ghosts were her own, and they wouldn’t let her rest.

But here she is, propped against the sofa with a teammate who doesn’t have a knife to her back, speaking of well rested nights, the ones spent by Wash’s side. It fills him with such a sense of hope that’s so light on his chest, and so sweet to his mind.

“What do you all want for breakfast?” He calls out, already knowing the answer he will receive.

It was always pancakes.

They are Caboose’s favorite, and he drenches them in nearly enough syrup to drown in. Wash could recall a time Carolina, not much taller than the counter, would do the same, a memory gifted to him and a curse all the same. Tucker has joined them now, eyes tired and staring into a steaming cup of coffee, groaning when Caboose tries to talk to him.

”We have to go exploring today, Tucker!” He’s excited, excited for the day ahead. Tucker is having none of it, he’s always grumpy when he wakes up, even more so when Caboose persistently exclaims whatever comes to mind. He snaps, the way he had so many times before, more of a bend than a break. A solid “Shut up, Caboose,” is thrown out, followed by a hand tousling the blue clad soldier’s too long hair.

He’s been softer with him, as of late. Less venom in his tone and more teasing affection.

“I’d like to hear about what you have in mind for today.” Carolina speaks, dulcet tones bringing a large, lopsided grin to Caboose’s face. He maps his plans out with crayons, yellow and blue and red scrawled on a piece of paper. Carolina watches with intent eyes, a small, content smile dancing on her lips. Caboose rambles of the adventures and perils they’d face, followed by a picnic near the bluff’s edge.

Wash watches Carolina as she watches Caboose, fascination and affection held within each individual gaze. Tucker puts in his input every once and a while, finger pointing to here or there on Caboose’s messy map.

This is their family,

one that they found, or one that found them,

and took them in as one of their own.

Home is within a battered blue base, where pancakes are an essential to life just as much as breathing.

Home is within sim soldiers of every hue, Reds and Blues alike, who befriend and berate each other like second nature.

Home is within a smile that he treasures so dearly, one that appears more and more as the days pass them by.

Battered and broken it may be, this is their home,

and to him? It’s beautiful.


End file.
